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He holds my gaze, making it impossible to lie. My throat closes up, as if a python were tightening around my neck. And looking at Zayne’s face, I finally see that’s what he is. A dangerous jungle snake. It’s what the little boy had to morph into in order to deal with the pain, to get away from what was done to him. From the searing on his skin and the smell of burnt flesh that rose into the air in that basement. From the grinning sneer on Top Boy’s face standing tall over him while he was chained to a pipe.
“I’d never leave you,” I whisper, completely immersed in the scene. My heart is shredding inside my chest.
Zayne searches my eyes with the gaze of an inquisitor.
“You’re lying at worst,” he rasps. “Or you’re unable to put yourself in that situation at best, because it’s not really an option, and you’re a pragmatic woman.”
“You can say whatever you want about me, Zayne Thorngren, but I’m a woman of my word. I made a commitment to you. I’d say the very least I have earned is the benefit of the doubt.”
His jaw works, and I know he’s considering whether he ever told anyone about the dream. He’s wondering about how I was able to see inside his mind, so far back. Neither of us believe in magic, yet here we are, dealing with it.
“Don’t bother. The chances that you might have told anyone about your troubles, let alone about your dreams, are non existent,” I say.
“There’s got to be an explanation for this,” he rumbles.
I raise my hand to brush my fingers through his hair. “Maybe if you took me to the orphanage. Maybe something in there could help explain our connection–”
“No,” he cuts me off. “It’s not the dream that I meant. It’s this craving that I have for you, right here–” He places his fist over his chest.
Everything in me screams to tell him that I feel the same way. That I wanted him from the moment I laid eyes on him. I was quick to blame it on his looks, thinking it was probably how he made every woman feel when he set his incredible eyes on her, and she knew that he was aware of her existence.
“I don’t understand,” he breathes. “It’s as if I can’t get close enough to you. No matter how often I fuck you, how dirty it gets, it only leaves me satiated for an hour at most. Then I want more.” He cups my face with a large, destructive hand. “You’re like a narcotic that I have to keep increasing the dose of.”
I rest my hand over his knuckles, my eyes searching his.
“That’s probably because what you need isn’t physical. Have you ever thought about that?”
“I don’t think about anything when I’m with you, that’s the thing. My rational mind dissolves completely.” God, I hate how much I want him to kiss me right now. But I can’t let that happen, not if I want this to go in the right direction.
His eyes move all over my face. Exploring, searching, seeking to understand.
“I think what you need is to explore the world of emotion. It seems to me like you never had the guidance to do that. But...” I steel myself to ask the question and to withstand the answer. “You must have had a girlfriend at some point.”
He smiles. “If that was supposed to be a smooth way of extracting information, I’m sorry to announce, it’s not so smooth.”
He twists around, taking my face in both hands, wanting to focus on me and not this subject. But I push through.
“Kelly, for example. You must have experienced some sort of emotional connection with her.”
“There’s nothing emotional between Kelly and me.” His thumbs brush over my cheekbones, but he offers no more information. It drives me mad, and he can see it. He likes it, too, otherwise he wouldn’t give me this shit-eating smirk.
“But the fact that you’re so interested in her tells me you’re jealous.”
My face burns. “So you understand jealousy. One more emotion in your spectrum.”
“Oh, I do understand it.” His dark eyebrows dip, casting a deadly shadow over his blue eyes. “Its ancient sibling, envy, is an old friend of mine.”
“Who did you envy?” I whisper.
“At first, the people who walked outside the orphanage gates, oblivious to what happened inside. Then the boarding school’s posh boys, before I realized they weren’t happy either.” His thumbs brush the skin under my eyes with a scary gentleness. “Then the man whose face you fucked at The Rite. And then, after you first came to see me, Joseph.” His thumbs move to my mouth, caressing my lips. “Envy turned into jealousy when I thought about him fucking this beautiful mouth while he still had you.”
“That was a long time ago,” I offer. “Joseph and I haven’t been with each other that way in many months. Maybe a year.”
“You don’t understand,” he whispers, his eyes roaming my face. “Emotions are timeless. There’s no difference between then and now to me. All the men that have ever touched you, I want them all dead.” He nods slowly, and even the patience in his voice turns threatening. “I want to burn every inch of their skin that ever had contact with yours. I want to make them sorry for ever thinking they were good enough to touch my goddess.”
I let loose a shaky sigh, his words rippling through me like the feathers of a raven.
“You seduce with your darkness,” I breathe. “I’m jealous too, you know, thinking how many women–” I stop before I accuse him of messing with women’s heads. I can’t risk him feeling put on the spot. “How many have lost their heads for you.”
